Philip Khor

The ironic thing is I work for a company called Investor Central. So day in day out, I look at how companies are performing, what stocks to buy, what news affect what industry / sectors. We also talk about Property and alternative investments once a while.

Personally though, I think investing is not for me.

Case Study A – Buying a RM 300,000 property

In KL, that’ll get you a decent 3 bedroom 1000 sqft apartment.

Assuming 100% loan (cuz you need furnishing, renovation, misc expenses), we’re talking of ~RM 1600 monthly payment over 30 years. Add up the instalments and we’re talking ~RM 580,000.

Whenever you wanna buy/sell, there’s always lawyer fees, utility deposits, and 101 things that can (and will) go wrong. Not to mention your precious time spent dealing with agents, contractors, prospective buyers. Even if you pay me RM 500 an hour of my time to deal with these non-sense, I don’t think I’ll do it! It is just too much hassle.

Renting a similar apartment in KL area costs only RM 1,300. Over 5 years, that is about RM 80,000 over 5 years in rental. Don’t like the place due to bigger family, switching demographics, bad feng shui? No problem. Pack up & leave. No repercussion. I think the renting scheme is definitely more flexible, less worry-some.

Flexibility

It gives the flexibility to pursue my dreams… working with Apple or Google. Things like that. Some say that when you leave the country, why not rent it out? Well, I’ve seen that happen, and the managing of the whole fiasco can be quite troublesome. In the end, minus expenses, you garner next to nothing.

Case Study B – Car Purchase – RM 40,000

Over a 9 year period that is RM 570 a month. Plus fuel, toll, petrol, servicing we’re looking at RM 1,100 per month average.

How to survive?

Today’s message in church mentioned something about staying in Malaysia; don’t migrate. The same theme and chorus Ps. Dr. Daniel (P. diddy) has been preaching for years now. I wonder when will change happen. When will we see a revolution?

>> Paperplane Pursuit – Forward

Perodua and Proton got bashed by popular UK Television series, Top Gear on their latest 3rd Episode of the 13th Season. Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond “tested” a MyVi (which Jeremy affectionately calls, Mee Vee), Satria Neo (the most expensive of the lot) and a Chevvy of similar class.

They took the car to the London Financial District to blame the Financial people who caused the Economic downturn leading to the creation of “such rubbish cars”. They then turned to the Big Ben area to protest to the Government. It was totally hillarious.

You see, the thing is, compared to our European and Japanese competitors, Malaysian cars, are inferior. In all aspects. The only reason our local car manufacturers are afloat is because of GOVERNMENT protectionism. Take away the redicul-TAX on foreign cars, and we’ll be driving Alfa Romeo Mito as @aidanlegend wishes. It is a sad state of affairs for us Malaysians. But if we can look past that, over the long run (if the world still exists beyond 2012), we would be proud to have a “mature car industry” and not rely on foreign car imports. As @lukasfoo like to FAMOUSLY quote GDP = C + something + something + NX

That NX means  Net Export. So if Malaysia is shipping “cheap usable cars” overseas in the near future, our Economy will prosper. Then our poor neighbours will be driving rubbish (hahahaha) and we’ll be rolling on premium shit.

With all said and done, my current dream car is a Proton Persona.. SE if there’s some cash to spare. AT 60k, its not that bad. Its a Gen 2 with a boot, spacious and quite sexy. Either that, or.. I could save up 2 years of salary, drive my dad’s old Saga to work… at the end of it, put a 30k down and 200k loan and buy myself a 2nd hand…

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Who needs a house when you can have a moving luxury hotel!

Ok, snap back to reality. Time to start a day, on the tune of DJ Mangoo’s – Eurodancer!